By
the light of a hotel room window in Oxford, moving back on line after time off
the grid in northern England, I read the astonishing news that I had been named
the Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year. I could not have been more surprised, and
grateful. As a writer I believe in “deep travel,” which means I report upon and
otherwise describe people in places with regard to their history, and
political, social and spiritual surroundings.
I am humbled and thrilled that the judges who looked at my work and
deemed it worthy of this recognition appreciated, and by their award, esteemed
this perspective. Maya Roads, for instance, includes not only the beauty of the Mesoamerican
rainforest, but also contains accounts of the violence of its recent past. The essay, “Gore Vidal’s Old House” suggests
the late writer, one of the keenest observers of U.S. foreign policy in the last sixty
years, began to form his critique of imperialism while living in Guatemala as a
young novelist (elsewhere on this site are links to these and other stories in
the portfolio given the Grand Award). I
am grateful to my agent, Andy Ross, the editors with whom I worked, and most of
all to individuals in several countries who allowed me to share their stories.
Here is the YouTube video of the awards presentation (my bit is at the end, Grand Award) http://youtu.be/PcYyqWIE_2s and here are the SATW press release and judges’ comments:
Mary
Jo McConahay, author, freelance writer, blogger and documentary filmmaker,
earned the title of Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year for a portfolio
of her work that included exceptional storytelling in “Maya Roads: One Woman’s
Journey Among the People of the Rainforest.” Afar magazine, Travel + Leisure
and the Los Angeles Times were the top winners, earning the most awards.
The
annual competition is sponsored by the Society of American Travel Writers
Foundation. Winners of the awards, the most prestigious in the field of travel
journalism, were announced Oct. 21 at the SATW convention, held this year in
Biloxi, on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. This is the 29th Lowell Thomas
competition and drew 1,257 entries. Judges were members of the faculty at the
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill School of Journalism and Mass
Communication. It is the premier competition in North America in the field of
travel journalism.
Grand
Award — Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year
Gold:
Mary Jo McConahay,
freelance writer, author, blogger and documentary filmmaker
The best travel writing
entices readers to be adventurous anywhere — from the remoteness of the
tropical rain forest to the density of sprawling Sao Paulo. Mary Jo McConahay
does just that in “Maya Roads: One Woman’s Journey Among the People of the
Rainforest” and “Navigating a Hypercity: Sao Paulo” and in other wonderful
articles such as “Gore Vidal’s Old House.” In the latter, McConahay walks us in
the footsteps of novelist, journalist and playwright Gore Vidal, who was a
World War II veteran and frequent critic of U.S. foreign policy in his later
years. Vidal’s life is center stage in “Old House,” which McConahay informs us
is not your typical residence: “In 1946, the author (Vidal), then just
twenty-one, took $3,000 from the payment for his first novel, ‘Williwaw,’ and
bought a crumbling 16th-century convent next to the ruins of Our Lady of
Carmen.”
In
“Navigating a Hypercity,” McConahay introduces Brazil’s largest city, which
requires serious travel planning before visiting:
“Despite
having traveled in more than eighty countries, I froze last year when planning
a trip to Sao Paulo, Pop: 20 million. It wasn’t the number itself that stopped
me — who can count to twenty million anyway? But descriptions called the largest
urban conglomeration in South America a hypercity, a term new to me, evoking
image of chaos, attention disorder and suffocating density. I got nervous.”
McConahay’s
writing is anything but chaos as she calmly advises would-be visitors on how to
best tour the city. From walking to eating, and of course shopping, she steels
our nerves to the point that we are ready to book a flight right now. With
outstanding writing and advice Mary Jo McConahay proves that she is both the
quintessential travel writer and exceptional storyteller. For that she earns
the gold in the Grand Award category.
The
SATW award competition is formidable and prestigious in the field because:
* it does not promote any particular destination
or travel product,
* it is open to all North American journalists,
not just SATW members, and
* it is judged independently by the faculty at top
U.S. schools of journalism.
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The
Foundation distributes nearly $20,000 in prize money to individual winners.
Generous donations by this year’s Underwriters, the Tourist Office for
Flanders-Brussels and Travel Guard, help make the prizes possible.
For
more information about the awards, including a full list of winners and judges’
comments, and SATW, visit www.satwf.com and www.satw.org.
SATW FOUNDATION
LOWELL THOMAS
TRAVEL JOURNALISM COMPETITION
29 Years of Rewarding Journalists
for Outstanding Work in the Field
